The Story

Since 2005, our family has been working hard to get a family member, Nayeli, into a safe home and out of a place where she was enduring severe physical and emotional abuse. After years, it seems we are finally there. We are in the final stages of paperwork and hoping to be reunited with her in a month, in Nicaragua where we will have her custody court case and file for adoption. The urgency of our situation is that we need to pay the adoption agency and lawyers now while we are doing the paperwork. The other urgent matter is that this is our one chance at getting custody of her and making sure she is safe.

It has been a long journey, trying to get Nayeli and her siblings into safety. From 2009 - 2010 (2 years) we had temporary custody of her and 4 of her siblings. At that time the children flourished in a home with us, started attending school, tae kwon do classes, therapy and cultural events. In the end of 2010, the Nicaraguan government gave their mother a second chance at parenting, but they were immediately placed in same situation as before. With no governmental follow up we were unable to remove them from the abuse they were once again experiencing. Since their mother passed in 2013, we have been working to get the children removed from their father and placed with other family. In the winter of 2016, we were able to get temporary custody of Nayeli again, and now we have been working throughout the year to make sure her custody with us is final, and that she have guaranteed safety and a home with us.

Now 15 years old, Nayeli has continued to express her desire to find permanent family with us. She is very close with our two children, especially having grown up partially with Amaru. And this year having formed a relationship with Itzel, who is four. Nayeli has so much compassion for her individual relationships with those she loves, while also having a very broad life vision. She thinks deeply about how she treats others, and how others treat her. She wants to learn languages and someday be a translator. She's been learning chess and guitar since being with us. Her strength is something I can't even begin to fathom, and how she blends all of these qualities together against the odds to do so.

We desire the safety and peace that she deserves, like any child that comes from an unsafe home. This has been a difficult and long journey for all of us and we want more than anything to be reunited and move into a place of growth and healing.

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Below are some of the fees and expenses we will be incurring. Hopefully this will cover 60% of our expenses for the adoption process.

This does not cover all of our Nicaraguan living costs, paperwork or our US living costs.